Inspired by the movie "Julie and Julia" I plan to re-watch and review every movie in my DVD collection in one year. Well, thirteen months. That's 166 movies in 13 months, which works out to about 3 a week.

"Of all the arts, movies are the most powerful aid to empathy, and good ones make us better people."-- Roger Ebert, The Great Movies

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Dr. Who and the Daleks

Title: Dr. Who and the Daleks

Director: Gordon Flemyng

Date: 1965

Studio: AARU Productions LTD, Regal Films International LTD

Genre: Science Fiction

Cast: Peter Cushing, Roy Castle, Jennie Linden, Roberta Tovey

Format: Technicolor, Techniscope (an early widescreen process)

Format: R1, NTSC, (Widescreen)

"Anyone can understand science if they put their minds to it." -- Dr. Who

"Why did they want to kill us? We came in peace." -- Thal"You are different from them, and they are afraid of anything different. And what people are afraid of, they try to destroy." -- Dr. Who"If we could reason with them." -- Female Thal"They are beyond reason, they wish only to conquer." --Dr. Who

I am a big, big fan of the wonderful British television series Doctor Who (1963-1989, 1996, 2001-), which is part of the reason I don't really care for this film. I'd seen it before and remembered it as being pretty awful. I did luck out an get a free second-hand copy from a friend (in a set with Dalek Invasion Earth 2150 AD, and Dalekmania) so I could add it to my Doctor Who collection without actually having to pay for it.

The film is basically a re-make of the Terry Nation Doctor Who serial, or episode, "The Daleks" (aka "The Dead Planet"). However, it takes considerable liberties with what it borrows. For example, even from the very beginning it was clear the Doctor wasn't human, but an alien from another planet. Fairly quickly into the series, it was revealed the Doctor was a Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. However, in this film, the Doctor is an eccentric Human inventor (called "Dr. Who" no less, rather than "the Doctor") -- a rather tired plot device often found in Disney live action films of the 60s and 70s (and often played by Dick Van Dyke or Fred MacMurray). Also, in the TV series -- Susan was a teenaged girl (and somehow the Doctor's grand-daughter), and Barbara and Ian were her human teachers. In this, Susan is about five years old, Barbara is also the Doctor's grand-daughter, and Ian is Barbara's boyfriend.

Dr. Who, as he's called in this film, shows Ian his TARDIS, which he invented. Soon they are whisked off to a mysterious dead planet. The Doctor sabotages his own machine because he wants to explore a nearby alien city. They run into Daleks. They discover they are suffering from radiation poisoning. They get a drug that cures the radiation sickness from the Thals. The Daleks decide to destroy the Thals. The Doctor convinces the Thals to fight. They sneak into the city and stop the deadly countdown of another "Neutronic" bomb and destroy the Daleks. Dr. Who finds his missing component to the TARDIS and they leave.

Taken by themselves, many of these plot elements are identical to the televised serial (which ran as seven, thirty-minute episodes or parts), but the television serial, in spooky black and white is in many cases much more effective. For example, the cliffhanger of an early episode has Barbara being attacked by something she can see but the audience can't ... all the audience sees is the infamous Dalek plunger. This cliffhanger builds suspense -- what is attacking Barbara? What does it even look like? The film skips the scene completely and the first time we see the Daleks, there are several of them -- it technicolor glory.

The brightly-colored Daleks are another problem. Most of the time in Doctor Who, even in later color episodes, the Daleks were all grey (with some black). This uniformity stressed the uniformity and conformity of the Dalek characters. Also, some analysts have suggested the grey-and-black was reminiscent of Nazi uniforms.

Finally, the acting in the film version of Dr. Who and the Daleks is greatly disappointing. Ian is silly, clumsy, and not at all brave. Barbara is weak, screams a lot, and has no spunk. Oddly enough, the young, yet intelligent, Susan (only five or eight, rather than a teenager), is the most engaging character besides Cushing's Doctor. The guest actors are no better. One Thal at one point thanks the Doctor with a tone that seems to suggest he thinks the exact opposite. And the Daleks are chatty! Daleks are not supposed to be chatty. "Exterminate!" "I obey!" That's about it. Not all the chatter.

Overall the only reason I have this film is I didn't have to pay for it, and it's a interesting and bizarre addition to my collection of Doctor Who (TV series) memorabilia. And, I am a bit of a complete-ist when I collect something.

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